Comfortable win for Meath hurlers against London

Meath crusied to an impressive 2-23 to 0-13 Christy Ring Cup first round victory against London at Pairc Tailteann today.

Meath laid the foundations for victory with a dominant first-half performance.

Padraig O'Hanrahan had Meath on the scoreboard inside 25 seconds with a well-taken point and while London levelled through Colin Nelson a minute later that was as good as it got for the Exiles in the opening quarter.

Meath forged into a whirlwind 1-8 to 0-1 in that opening quarter with four points from Jack Regan (two frees), a brace from wing-back James Kelly and one by Alan Douglas.

Eamon Ó Donnacadh flashed the sliotar to the net in the 11thminute after a lapse in the London defence.

Douglas claimed Meath's second goal when he was put trhough by a superb Gavin McGowan pass and the extra points were added by Ó Donnacadh, James Kelly and Damien Healy.

London lost corner back Denis O'Regan to a 27thminute injury and hit nine wides as they laboured for scores with Aaron Sheehan (three frees) and Mark O'Dwyer from play sending over points as they trailed by 0-5 to 2-11 at the interval.

Meath did enough in the second-half to ease to a comfortable win with Jack Regan adding a further eight points to take his overall tally to 12 for the 70 minutes, but they also lost substitute Adam Gannon who was stretchered-off with five minutes remaining.